


Collateral Damage

by ashisfriendly, mouseratstan



Category: Parks and Recreation
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, F/M, Fluff, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-25
Updated: 2020-08-25
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:15:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26112511
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ashisfriendly/pseuds/ashisfriendly, https://archiveofourown.org/users/mouseratstan/pseuds/mouseratstan
Summary: It's all done and over with. He's cutting ties, and he's leaving town. She’ll have to be okay with seeing him out.4x5 "Meet 'n' Greet" Canon Divergence
Relationships: Leslie Knope/Ben Wyatt
Comments: 24
Kudos: 77





	Collateral Damage

**Author's Note:**

> A collab fic that combines older era Parks fic (ashisfriendly) and newer era Parks fic (mouseratstan), an iconic collab to end all collabs.
> 
> We hope you enjoy!

The last thing Ben needs is another tether to this godforsaken town.

He walks into his house and the anger hits him as forcefully as the toy skeleton from the doorway, jerking him backwards. Decorations cover the living room, he smells food from the kitchen, and it  _ reeks  _ of a poor cleaning job, a sad party that Ben knows he has to avoid at all costs.

_ No. No, no, no, no, no. _

He's been doing  _ good,  _ goddammit. After his little slip-up with a Batman costume and lots of tears and some consolation from Donna and Tom, he hasn't let himself fall so low again. That's the first and the last time he'll allow himself to break, and it should be smooth sailing from here. He's been putting his head down and getting his work done, refusing to go out, distancing from the people around him. It's his system and it  _ works. _

It's hard enough that he has to avoid his own roommates. It's an entire game, getting to and from his room everyday, hoping to God that he's just missed them, that they haven't set up some kind of trap, that they might decide he's too “lame” to talk to that day. And it's not like he  _ hates  _ Andy and April… he's actually pretty fond of them. But that's exactly the problem, it's an attachment to Pawnee. A reason to stay. His reasons are slowly dwindling, but even just  _ one  _ reason will keep him here, trap him in place,  _ and he just can't do that anymore. _

If he gets too involved, he’ll just start to crumble, and he'll grow attached all over again. And he'll never be able to force himself to leave if he’s in any way attached.

“I take it we’re having a party,” Ben mumbles, making his way through the living room with quiet footsteps. Both Andy and April are zipping themselves up into properly obnoxious costumes, so nonchalantly as if there's no issue here at all.

“Dude, I  _ knew  _ there was something I forgot to tell you,” Andy winces. “Sorry.”

Ben knows deep down Andy is genuine, just as he always is, and he  _ wants  _ to have pity, he really does. But there's only so much room left inside him for his carefully hidden emotions, and right now, he feels very eerily close to exploding already. All that's left is frustration, plain and simple. “No, no, no, it's fine,” he lies through his teeth, and he doesn't even bother to hide his dripping sarcasm. “Why should you guys tell me you were gonna have an enormous party? I didn't tell you I was gonna be quietly working in my room.”

April shoots him a knowing look, one that's more irritation than anything else, as Andy just continues to grin, failing to recognize Ben’s true feelings. “That's a good point,” he laughs. “I guess we're even.”

“If you need me, I'll definitely be awake. Because I won't be able to sleep… because of the party.”

Ben doesn't think he can make himself any more clear in that moment, that's he's upset because  _ they should've told him.  _ They should've warned him days in advance so he could make sure to lock up his room and steer clear of the house, maybe head to a bar or sit in his car for a couple hours, anything but having to bear witness to a disaster of a Ludgate-Dwyer party on a night that he really,  _ really  _ just needs to be alone.

He shuts his bedroom door a little too roughly, maybe, before collapsing at his desk, head in his hands. He tugs at his hair, messing it up, but he doesn't care, not even a little bit, he's just  _ tired.  _ So, so tired. And something about this party almost feels like the last straw, the last little bit he needs in order to snap, to make the decision he knows he needs to make, if he's finally strong enough.

His eyes flicker up seemingly against his will, zeroing in on his wall, where so few pictures and memories remain. Everyday he takes something down off his bulletin board and packs it away, throws it away, does  _ something  _ just to keep it from him, tiny bits and pieces of Pawnee that he breaks apart from one by one, until only one remains. Just one picture, one he hasn't been able to get rid of, one that haunts him and keeps him very firmly planted here in this town that will ruin him.

There's a twist in his gut as he stares at that picture, that terrible, awful picture of him in a  _ Li’l Sebastian  _ t-shirt, standing next to a dazzlingly bright Leslie Knope. She's wearing pink and her hair is curled to perfection, and as she grins down at that stupid little mini-horse, Ben only has eyes for her. There's something raw and real in the way he looks at her, so exposed and vulnerable that he can only wonder how nobody caught them. He didn't hide it well, the way he loved her— he could never even hide it from himself. And maybe that’s the biggest problem.

The breakup was inevitable. Ben and Leslie were never meant to last. Anybody could've seen that, and both of them should have. Their ambitions aim too high and they met at the wrong time and there would be no way to continue on unscathed. Leslie’s career is the most important thing in her life— she wanted this long before she ever wanted him. Ben just so happened to be some sort of collateral damage, losing all he ever wanted for the sake of her dreams. And the worst part is, he would do it again. He would make the same decision every time, to ruin himself if it means she gets to thrive.

Clearly it's for the best. If he always looked at her the way he does in that tiny little photo on his wall, they were bound to get caught eventually.

Ben groans, a frustrated sound low in his throat, and makes a decision, right then and there. The longer this picture is on his wall, the longer he lives in this house, the longer he  _ stays in Pawnee,  _ the worse he's going to get, until eventually he explodes into something he can't control. It'll never get better if he doesn't take the next hard step, and he can't keep expecting things to sort themselves out in the back of his mind, as if magically everything will be okay again if he just waits it out.  _ No.  _ No. It's time to go. It's time to move on.

He gets up and leans over his desk, bracing his palm on his bulletin board and ripping the photo right off. It tears a little, just at the top from where it was pinned, and for some reason this tear hits him in his gut, even makes him want to cry. His fingers brush over Leslie’s image, how purely happy she looks, so completely radiant in the sunlight and basking in the glow of her Harvest Festival success. He hopes to see her like that again, someday, when she's winning her seat on City Council and Ben watches her make her acceptance speech from a television in another city.

He promises himself he’ll never forget her. He doesn't even think it's possible.

Ben shoves the photo of her in his drawer, deciding to throw it away, out of this house, the first chance he gets. As for now? He pulls up his email and starts to write his resignation letter.

He just can't be here anymore.

***

He's only halfway through his resignation when he's leaving his room again, making his way back into the house to say  _ something  _ about the noise. In the hour or so that Ben has been locked in his room, the party seems to have started and completely livened up, fully in the swing of things by the look of it. The house is crawling with people, music pounding in his ears and vibrating against the walls. Even Chris is here, dressed as Sherlock Holmes and dancing with Jerry’s daughter, which makes Ben a little embarrassed, thinking of his resignation letter in progress. He definitely won't be mentioning that tonight.

He scans the room for Andy and April as if to pick a bone with them, elbowing past dancers and co-workers and people he doesn't even know. He runs from Orin, who stares him down, and pointedly avoids a conversation with Ron and Ann, who are both making their way through the house with a toolbox. He only just spots April’s deflated sumo wrestler costume when his eyes shift just to the right of her, to the person she's talking to, and—  _ oh, god. _

_ Leslie is here. _

She's actually, seriously here, in his house, at his roommate’s Halloween party. For some reason, when imagining all the different ways tonight could go wrong, he never exactly imagined this, even though it makes sense. Of  _ course  _ Leslie would come to her friends’ Halloween party, especially with the way she loves this holiday and she  _ definitely  _ loves all things sweet. 

She's popping hard candy into her mouth and giggling at something April is saying, and it occurs to Ben that he can't stop staring. She's dressed as if she has the intention to kill him— a tiny khaki romper that cinches at the waist, shorts that cut off just above mid-thigh to leave  _ that  _ much more of her legs exposed. Her hair is pulled back from her face and there's hiking boots on her feet, but Ben doesn't quite understand her costume until he notices the little stuffed chimpanzee she's hugging to her chest.

_ Of course  _ Leslie Knope would dress as Jane Goodall for Halloween.

He's still staring, watching her as her lips twist into a grin, the way her whole body leans forward and shakes with her laughter. It sends chills down his spine, freezes his brain, until someone  _ slams  _ into him and he almost falls over, waking himself up.

Oh, god. He has to get away from here.

He starts to inch away, eager to find his way back to his room before somebody catches him. He already sticks out like a sore thumb by not having a costume on and because he's not dancing like the others, and the last thing he needs right now is to accidentally strike up a conversation. His emotions are all over the place at the moment, and,  _ good lord,  _ Leslie is dancing now.

She's dancing with April and Andy and even though it's nothing provocative, nothing inherently sexual, the way she swings her hips and giggles at the motion does something to him,  _ really  _ does something to him. She holds her stuffed chimpanzee with one hand while the other slides down her thigh as if she's exhausted, bending over with her back to him, those little shorts on her romper  _ just  _ riding up—

_ “Fuck,”  _ Ben hisses, shaking himself out of his reverie. Images of her underneath him, naked and willing and trembling, pressed against him, flash through his mind until there's a tenting on his pants, and now he  _ really  _ needs to go. It's a precarious situation, and somehow he finds himself chugging half a beer down his throat as if that'll solve anything at all.

No, what he really needs is a goddamn cold shower.

He manages to lose sight of her, so he slowly skirts around the edges of the party, trying to keep in control of his own filthy, angsty mind. He wants to blame April and Andy, wants to blame them for all of it, because he never would've had to see her if it wasn't for this party. They threw this stupid thing and invited her into the place where Ben _lives and sleeps_ without a care in the world for how _he_ might feel about it, because there's no respect for him here. There's no respect at all, as if he's not an equal, and now Ben feels as if he's only moments away from snapping and causing a scene, throwing himself at his roommates until one of them apologizes.

But then Leslie will see him.

_ Bury it down, bury it down.  _ He doesn't need to say a thing. If he can just get to his room, lock his door again, and get back to his resignation letter, all can be solved. He’ll take his cold shower as soon as it feels safe and he’ll get to bed and forget all about everything that isn't work. He'll turn in his resignation letter to Chris in the morning, finish up with only two weeks to go, and then finally pack up and leave Pawnee, throwing out that little picture of him and Leslie as he goes. 

It's over, and it's time to stop pretending they can be okay again. She isn't the one, and he just has to be fine with that.

The tears threaten to come and he curses himself, wills himself to stop before someone sees. He already slipped up and cried once, which was bad enough. If he does it again, people are bound to get suspicious, wonder what's wrong with him, ask him questions that he can't answer. And it's hell, really hell, to suffer in silence. And maybe—  _ just maybe,  _ Ben is a little bit bitter that Leslie can talk to Ann about it, her mother, even  _ Ron  _ if he allows her, if she's feeling down about the breakup, but he gets nobody. He gets comfort from Donna and Tom only after he’s completely broken down from the stress of it all, and even then he had to explain his situation in an impossibly vague undertone, leaving all names and details out.

_ I was seeing a woman, for a while. And then we stopped seeing each other, uh, pretty recently. _

It's not even the half of it. Not even close to just how terrible his situation really is, and he can't tell anyone, can't explain why he has to leave, or why he isn't seen in the Parks and Rec department anymore, why he can't even look a certain blonde employee in the eye, why he can't—

“Ben?”

He spins around to find himself in the kitchen, cradling a new beer bottle in his shaking hands. He's nowhere near his room, and of course, just to top off his luck, Leslie is right in front of him, staring up at him with cautiously hopeful eyes.

“Leslie,” he mumbles, squinting at her. “Ah— hi.”

“Hi,” she repeats. “I was wondering where you were.”

“I— you were?”

“Of course I was, silly, I know you live here!” She giggles, the lightest of sounds, and Ben can tell she’s trying very hard to act as perfectly normal as she can, as if nothing happened between them at all. But Ben knows her, he can see right through her. Her smile doesn't quite reach her eyes, wide and refusing to look at him for too long, and her hands clutch her stuffed chimpanzee much too tightly, her knuckles turning white, her fingers trembling. She keeps rocking on her heels, just slightly, like she can't possibly stand still. 

“Oh,” Ben whispers, swallowing hard, and he can't quite seem to figure out what to say to her. He doesn't even remember the last time they had a real conversation  _ (that's a lie— he remembers every minute of it, but it was too long ago)  _ and all of a sudden he's forgotten how to talk to her at all, how to be normal. Every action feels wrong, and like it might be suspicious, looking over his shoulder to see if anyone is watching them. “Listen, I… I don't know if we should…”

“We can't be prosecuted just for talking, Ben,” she says matter-of-factly, and yet not without an unmistakable hint of offense. “There's nothing wrong with this. Is there?”

“I… no. No, I guess not.” But there  _ is.  _ There is, because his heart won't stop beating so quickly, like he can't breathe, his chest aching. Just looking at her is painful, a reminder of what he can't have, and seeing her in person is so, so much worse than seeing a tiny picture of her on his bulletin board. “I just… I don't know... if I… can do this.”

Her face falls, and that enough makes him cave, struggling not to reach out and simply hold her to him. “You can't… talk to me?”

“Oh god— Leslie, I'm sorry. Listen, I’m just…” He struggles again, stumbling over every word, his hand reaching up to run through his already properly disheveled hair. “I'm… I'm trying, okay? I'm really bad at this, and I'm kind of a mess, and I want to do better. But at least I'm trying.”

It's another lie, he thinks, if only because he's right on the edge of giving up. His resignation letter is still half written and up on his computer, parts of his room are even packed. But he's been trying for  _ so long now  _ that he doesn't know how much more of it he can take, at which point giving up is the better option for his emotional well-being. 

Leslie is staring at him, something almost like disbelief in her eyes. “You've… you've been a mess?”

“You haven't been able to tell?” He gestures at the state of himself, his messy hair and untucked shirt, his beer already almost gone. “I've… been having a hard time adjusting. And just… being at this party, and seeing you here… it hurts. It really fucking hurts. But I'm  _ trying.” _

She's quiet for a moment, as if attempting to process this. The words seem to hit her, making her take a step back, eyes flickering to her boots instead of looking him in the face. It's possible he had gotten a little too honest. “Well,” she breathes, “I appreciate you trying. Even if it hurts you to… talk to me.  _ Lasting change is a series of compromises.” _

Ben can't help it— he grins.  _ “And compromise is alright, as long as your values don't change,”  _ he finishes. “Jane Goodall. I like your costume, by the way.”

She looks at him with something like awe, as if she didn't expect him to get it. And he knows deep down that all night people have been asking her what her costume is, what it means, and she's  _ tired.  _ And once again, he proves to understand her in a way that no one else does.

This is dangerous ground.

“Ben,” she chokes, and he knows this conversation is about to go down a deeper, darker turn  _ now,  _ if he doesn't get away in time. “Ben, listen, I need to—”

“I need to go,” he interrupts her, searching for an excuse. “I need, um… I need… to find… Ron. Yeah, Ron. He's fixing things around the house, I need him to fix something for me. But really, great talking to you, I'm glad you're okay—"

“Ben, don’t—”

“Bye!”

He rushes off, refusing to take even one look back at her. He can't, he won't, he wouldn't be able to stomach seeing her in pain. But there's no way he can handle another heartbreak, not when he's so close to getting out of here with some of his dignity still intact. He's acting like a fool, thinking he can have a conversation with Leslie and be alright after it.  _ He isn't supposed to be letting himself get attached.  _ She's the last goddamn thing keeping him here in this small town, the only name left on his list, and he can't even call her  _ his.  _ It's one more thing he needs to be able to cross off, just like ripping their picture off the wall. And if she's the one who ends up getting hurt in the process this time… well, it'll be better for the both of them in the end.

It's all done and over with. He's cutting ties, and he's leaving town. She’ll have to be okay with seeing him out. 

And he thinks it'll be fine, and he's actually gotten away with it, until he finally manages to work his way back into his room only twenty minutes later, after trying so desperately to look like he's enjoying himself in order to avoid Leslie. It becomes very clear, all of a sudden, why he hasn't seen her for the last several minutes, why he thought she might've left the party.

He opens his bedroom door and finds her standing there, her stuffed chimpanzee lying limp on the floor. She stands amongst his half-packed boxes, his empty walls, eyes wide and glistening with real tears as she stares at his open computer screen, his resignation waiting to be sent.

“Ben?” she questions, looking at him with wide, sad eyes. Heartbroken ones, betrayed ones, as if she can't quite believe what she's seen. “Ben? What's going on?”

There's no escaping this one.

_ Oh, god. _

***

A siren’s going off in her ears. It’s rattling her brain with its scream. 

It was dull before, a soft warning as she got dressed. A cautionary hum as she got in her car. A whisper of warning as she stepped into the house and greeted everyone. The sound mixed with thumping music, her eyes searching for him and the sound calming with every sweep of the room that resulted in his absence. 

She was thankful.

She was disappointed.

So she let loose, danced with her friends, screamed song lyrics, and shook her head every time someone got her costume wrong, but tried to smile through it anyway. People rarely understand her costumes, she’s used to it by now.

Then she saw him and the alarm shifted into a melody, one she remembered, but has now changed. Of course it changed.

When he said her name, all familiar and foreign, the alarm was almost gone. But as they talked, it blasted again, surging with the shift in his face, how his frown deepened and his eyes turned cold. His hands shook and sadness clutched at his muscles, turning down his shoulders and rattling his limbs. The alarm was the loudest it had been so far. 

She took a moment, calmed down, pushed tears back that she refused to let fall and then decided to find him again. They could work through this, they  _ had _ to work through this. 

Leslie needed him.

Friend, work acquaintance, man who walked down the hall, whatever it was he could be for her, she needed it. They’ll figure it out, they always do. 

Don’t they?

So she went to his room to talk to him, since that’s where he’d obviously been hiding all night. 

She opened his door and the alarm bells came to life once again, electricity flowing to the ring like lightning. Boxes with clothes and files packed, the bare walls, it all was screaming at her. 

_ He’s leaving _ , it said.  _ He doesn’t need you _ , it yelled.  _ He’s already gone _ , it cried.

He’s leaving.

Fifi, the chimp, fell to the floor as she saw his computer screen. A resignation letter, in all its finality. 

The siren screams. Louder, louder, louder.

He’s here, his name scraped against her throat in a plea, in question.

“Ben?” she asks. “Ben?” she repeats herself, as if it might reverse all she’s seen, maybe take her out of this fever dream. “What’s going on?”

“Leslie,” he says, in that way. 

That way that used to keep her up at night when she wanted to propose something new, when her ideas were thrown in the trash, when he was nothing but numbers and red tape and broken dreams to her. 

Her heart shatters, the pieces scattering around the room, falling into boxes for him to take with him.

“Leslie,” he says again. Softer this time, his eyes roaming her face and the way his resolve breaks a little, in the slope of his shoulders and the deepening frown, causes some familiar crushing feeling to rush through her gut. “I— shit.” 

Ben runs a hand through his hair and the motion, the break in his eye contact, snaps something in her spine and she stands up straight. She sniffles, blinks away the tears, and rubs her hands together.

“Well, this is obviously a mistake.”

“I’m sorry?” Ben snaps out of whatever frantic concentrative trance he was in to think of something to say. Good thing she knows exactly what to do.

“This is a mistake. You’re not leaving.”

He tilts his head, eyes narrowing in a small hint of knowing.

“Leslie.”

“I’ll help you redecorate. You need it, anyway, no offense.”

Leslie spins and goes for the box closest to her. It’s full of clothes, nothing for work, all basketball shorts and soft, worn t-shirts. She surpasses the urge to take a long inhale of his detergent, of him, that must linger on these clothes. Clothes she’s slept in, and clothes he’s worn in her house while cautiously working in her kitchen to make them breakfast. 

_ “I’m going to hire someone to clean this up,” he said once, a small knot of laughter in his throat. _

_ “The waffles aren’t going to cook themselves, Wyatt,” she shouted back, laying down on her couch without a shirt, just how he liked it. _

“Now, should we refold these? Actually, let's worry about that later,” Leslie says, opening a dresser drawer and shoving his clothes inside. “We can always come up with a system.”

“Leslie.”

“Now,” Leslie says, ignoring the way her voice struggles along the lump in her throat. She digs in a different box, taking out a Luke Skywalker bobble head. “Okay, maybe Luke can guide you as you work or something.” She places Luke on Ben’s desk. “I don’t remember what he does exactly, but I’m sure he’ll help you get some work done when—”

“Leslie—”

“—you need to do some work at home.” Leslie turns to the nearest box.

“Leslie, stop,” Ben pleads, and Leslie feels a pull to listen, to really listen to his voice and the sirens in her head and take a breath, but she keeps going. Warnings be damned.

“This is just ridiculous,” Leslie says, voice rising in pitch and volume. “Why would you leave Pawnee, anyway? Pawnee is amazing, the best place in Indiana, definitely America, and most importantly the world.” 

She hears Ben sigh and shift behind her, a sound coming out of his throat that she can’t decipher and doesn’t have time to do so. She keeps rifling through boxes and she doesn’t even know what she’s picking up anymore or where she’s putting it. She just needs to keep his things in this room, in this town. 

With her.

“I mean, it’s crazy,” Leslie says, a laugh escaping with the words. A tear falls, but she ignores it. Ignores it, ignores it, ignores it. “Why would you even want to leave Pawnee, Ben? You love Pawnee.”

“No, I don’t,” Ben says, so low she almost doesn’t hear him over the thump of the music and the blaring in her ears. Almost doesn’t catch the wobble in his voice with the panic coursing through her veins and the heartbreak lacing every move of her body. 

“Of course you do, Ben, you’ve been to every part of this town! You’ve walked Ramset Park at sunset, and eaten three meals in one day at JJ’s, and you work for the government…”

She loses momentum with all the memories that flood her. Leslie shakes her head and starts putting some clothes on his bed and pens in his dresser drawers. She can feel Ben’s eyes watching her, sensing the unease as he paces, or rather just rocks on his feet, taking steps when his own emotions get the best of him. Leslie wants to look up at him, see the wild fray of his hair that he’s been combing his hands through, tugging with trembling fingers. But she only shakes her head harder, the tears flowing freely now.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she says, louder this time, fighting for assurance, confidence. “You love Pawnee!”

_ “No, I don’t,”  _ he yells. Ben isn’t a stranger to anger, but he hardly raises his voice. His anger usually simmers and lingers under his skin, seeping out through sarcastic remarks and tight shoulder muscles. “I don’t love Pawnee. I love  _ you _ .”

Leslie freezes. There’s a beat, and another, blinks of her watery eyes that spring new tears, rolling down her cheek and landing in his pile of clothes she’s created on the bed. So much time passes that she’s convinced he’ll take it back, surely he’ll say something else, but he doesn’t.

So she looks up at him.

He’s absolutely broken.

Ben’s eyes are dark and glossy, the set of his shadowed jaw clenched. She knows he’s biting the inside of his cheek, a habit that she noticed sometime during the government shut down when she was relentless or he was tired of telling her no. His hair is wild, his chest and shoulders moving with each deep, quick breath. Nothing about him screams regret or a frantic need to correct himself, no, this is him at the end of his line. 

Completely done.

Finally he moves. His hand rises to his face and he rubs his jaw, then wipes both hands over his face, a broken smile left in their wake. 

“You’re fucking unbelievable.”

“Ben—”

“You’re unbelievable!” he says again, an edge laced in his voice that sends more tears falling from her eyes, fire running up her spine. “I was going to  _ leave,  _ Leslie. Fuck!”

Leslie takes a step back, not because she’s afraid of him, she’s never been afraid of him, but because he comes alive, emotions flying off him and ricocheting off the walls. 

He laughs, but it’s not kind. It rips at her heart. 

“I’m so  _ fucking _ in love with you.” He paces, small steps in this little space that can’t seem to contain him anymore. The words are washing over her, seeping into her veins and causing her own emotions to run amok. “I wasn’t lying, Leslie, this is hard for me. Impossible. Yeah,” he says, shaking his head with a scoff, “this is fucking impossible.”

“Ben, okay, I-I’ll leave.”

“No.” Ben stops her, a hand out before she can get anywhere. They aren’t touching, but there’s something between his hand and her body that fills the space. Her heart beats wildly in her chest. “You’re crying.”

Leslie can’t keep up, she’s on a roller coaster and she just desperately wants off. Ben is yelling and angry, he’s kind and hurt. She doesn’t know which feeling to chase, which one to mend, which one to fix. She thought making him stay would fix everything, but she’s made it worse. She wants off. She wants to leave. She wants to stay. She wants to kiss him. She wants him. She wants, wants, wants.

When you want as much as her, with dreams bursting and optimism flowing, and the entire universe ready for the taking, it can be hard to let go. It can be hard to know anything else. It can be earth shattering to have anything be taken away.

And when Ben was taken away? So was her entire universe. And it only took seeing him packed away in boxes and his exit written out on a computer screen for her to realize it. 

“I can’t be here anymore,” Ben confesses. His hand drops from stopping her but it’s still extended toward her, just a little. She sees the tremble in his fingers and she lets out a hiccup. “I… I can’t move on if I stay here.”

“Don’t move on, then.”

Ben laughs. It’s bitter and the sound scratches at her skin. “Please, Leslie.” He gestures to himself. “I need to move on.”

“I need you,” she spits out. She’s begging and she watches as her words undo him. She’s surprised he hasn’t fallen to the ground yet. She’s surprised she hasn’t.

“Leslie. Christ.” He pinches the bridge of his nose and she catches his thumb wiping the corner of his eye. “You… you’ve worked your whole life for this. I’m not going to fuck up your life.” He blinks and takes a deep breath. “So I’m leaving.”

“No,” Leslie says, taking a step toward him. He recoils and she stops, but doesn’t step back. “Please.”

“Don’t do this,” he begs. “I can’t do this. I can’t be here and not be with you.” He closes his eyes as she moves toward him again. She can’t stop. She’s seen his life in boxes, she’s caught a whiff of his detergent, his soap, the memories flooding back to her. The alarms are going off for her to stop but she can’t listen to them. 

“Ben,” she whispers.

They’re close enough to touch now, but he’s keeping his eyes closed. He sways toward her, hands soft and cautious as they find her waist. Ben drops his forehead to hers and they both exhale like they haven’t taken a proper breath in months.

She’s crying, her voice shaking as she asks, “Why did you let me go?”

He shakes his head and hers lulls with the movement, bringing him closer, his nose nudging down until it rubs against her own. Her heart is expanding, beating along every inch of her body. She can feel his breath against her face and his fingers are moving up her sides, sliding up her arms. 

“You said we had to break up,” she breathes as he cups her face, thumbs rubbing the tears off her cheeks. “Why did you do that?”

“I didn’t want to ruin you.” His lips brush the apple of her left cheek and her knees shake, her skin rolling with electricity and relief. She gasps, the exhale shaky. “Ruin what you built.”

“Build it with me,” she says. “Build everything with me.”

His hands slip down to her neck. His thumbs push up under her jaw, tilting her lips toward his.

“Don’t let me destroy it.”

She smiles, a sob escaping with it. She swallows to steady her voice so she can speak with strength. Certainty.

“You could never.”

He kisses her, and she springs to life. 

She pushes up on her tiptoes, her hands sliding up to his shirt, gripping the fabric, pulling him closer. He sighs and she moans, the contact overwhelming, but she needs more. She pushes her hands up and around his neck, pulling him closer, closer, closer. 

Relief. Memories. It’s all flooding her now, the familiar touch of him, the smell, the taste. She remembers this, remembers needing it, remembers never wanting to let it go. How did she ever let it go?

His hands fly to her waist and push down over her ass, his body crouching to reach her thighs and she jumps, spreading her legs and wrapping them around his middle. His hands help her settle, holding her until he slams her against a wall, mumbling a sorry against her lips. She shakes her head and tangles her fingers through his hair. 

She’s missed his hair, the feel of it, the wild nature of it, how it smelled like artificial rainfall and trees. How it looks wild against her pillows and between her thighs. She missed his powerful body that always found a way to push her against a wall, hold her against furniture, throw her down on beds or desks. Misses the greedy way his hands fly over her chest, how quick they are at finding skin, how big they feel along her body. 

Her tongue traces his mouth and she moans against his tongue in turn. Leslie smiles at the familiar sting of his teeth on her bottom lip, sighs his name as his mouth travels south, nose nudging her jaw so he can claim space along her neck.

There’s a crash outside his door and shouting and it makes them both jump, but doesn’t distract Ben as he starts working on the buttons of her romper. Leslie bucks against his waist, craving friction, and also his mouth on her collarbone. He bites her neck, gently putting her down so he can concentrate on her clothes. He groans.

“What is this?” Ben pushes her sleeves down and dives along the tops of her breasts, skipping her collarbone altogether. “Take it off.”

Leslie rolls her eyes, gasping as his tongue dips underneath the top of her bra before biting the skin there. She pushes her romper down over her hips and toes off her boots, stepping out of her clothes with some difficulty as she sighs and groans with every move of his mouth. 

Her hands find his tie, but Ben is faster, spinning and pushing her until she falls onto his mattress, right on top of some of his clothes she threw there. He’s quick to slip his fingers into the sides of her underwear and pull them down her legs, tossing them aside and dropping to his knees without ceremony. 

“Ben,” she gasps, watching him take her in, eyes focused between her legs like he’s memorizing her, remembering her, relishing her.

“Huh?” he asks half heartedly, his mind obviously elsewhere. He starts kissing her thighs, wet sloppy kisses that make her hips buck.

“You want this, right?” Her breaths are heavy and irregular as his lips travel over her legs.

“Yes,” he growls, thumbs pressing into her hip bones. She moans.

“I’m not—  _ ah—  _ you said you were leaving and—”

“Shh,” he whispers, licking along the crease of her inner thigh. Leslie whines, pushing her hips up. “I’m not leaving.”

She sighs, his tongue moving to her other thigh, sliding it along the sensitive flesh. Higher, higher, higher.

“Promise?” Leslie asks, her voice cracking as his fingers find her outer lips and slide up and down, breath hot against her. He spreads her open and the anticipation of his mouth, his tongue, for all of him has her whole body humming.

“I promise. I’m yours, Leslie Knope.”

She means to reply, to tell him that she’s his, too, that he’s claimed every inch of her, mind, body, and soul. Tell him that he’s her entire universe and her partner, a rock that anchors her to the ground, a guiding light to everything she wants and needs in this life. She means to tell him she loves him, maybe just to hear him say it to her again, this time with soft breath and not bubbling anger. 

But none of it comes out, instead his tongue flattening against her spread open cunt, and she loses every coherent thought. It's nothing but sensations and the feel of his lips on her clit and his tongue exploring and tasting and lavishing every last drop of her. She grips his hair and he somehow finds a way to push deeper. Her legs fly over his shoulders, heels digging into his back. With every push of her foot on his spine, he groans, and she chases the vibrations with her hips until she’s holding his hair in one hand while grinding against his face.

She’s chasing this feeling and the sight of him, the sounds he’s making and she’s making, punctuated by the bass of the music from the party outside his door. 

Leslie misses kissing him so she pulls on his hair, but he just dips lower, slipping his tongue around her entrance, his nose nudging her clit, and she flops back on the mattress. He’s slowed her down and she wants to be mad at him, but it’s hard when he’s eating her so devine and  _ slowly, _ with detail and patience that is only Ben Wyatt. 

“Ben,” she moans, feeling him move, and she sneaks a glance down at him, catching his hand moving to his crotch, and it’s the thought of him needing to feel the relief from the taste of her that sends a fresh bolt of arousal through her body. 

He groans and adjusts again, flattening his tongue at her clit before circling and sucking. Leslie’s fingers grip his bedspread and she screams, thankful for the noise of the party to drown them out, because she can’t be quiet— she’s never been good at it, and she especially isn't now. 

The relief is too great. 

There were nights she couldn’t sleep, too tormented by the memories of him in her bed, or the whispers of kisses she could recount so vividly on her skin. She would wrap herself in a blanket burrito like he did in her bed just to feel like he was there, as if the blankets could ever capture the essence of him. There were mornings she didn’t want to get out of bed even if she never fell asleep in the first place. What was the point? To maybe see Ben and feel her heart break again and again as her day went on?

Pawnee even lost its flare, too overcome with memories of him. She couldn’t enjoy a walk through the park without remembering coffee mornings with him, her hands warm against her cup and the early sun squinting his eyes. The halls of City Hall were haunted with stolen kisses and hand holding and whispered promises. 

She was lost, before.

And now she’s found.

Ben says her name against her, the sound desperate and pleading. She groans, lazily sneaking her fingers through his hair as his hands move up her thighs and spreads them wider. He slips a finger into her cunt, and she practically flies off the mattress. She can feel his teeth on her as he smiles, his free hand pushing down on her hip as he pumps his finger in and out of her for a few strokes before inserting another one.

She’s full and wet and worshipped. He drinks her down and each sip is followed by the chase of his fingers pushing, curling and pumping into her. She rocks against him, words falling out of her mouth that are just complete nonsense of  _ yes, fuck, more, Ben, please, yes, yes, yes _ .

Leslie’s climbing and he follows her with the expertise only he possesses. Like no one before. She squirms, overwhelmed, but he follows her, holds her, and keeps going, encouraging her with groans and the mumbling of her name against her cunt. She’s begging him— for what, she’s not sure, but she can’t stop saying his name and whining, needing something. Needing more, more, more.

He delivers and her nerve endings ignite until she’s just seeing supernovas and every muscle in her body tightens with the explosion.

She’s whining with the come down, begging him to come here, but he’s busy cleaning her up and helping her down from the extraordinary climb. When his fingers slip out of her she cries out at the loss, but he kisses her thighs, softly running his fingers up and down her skin. He helps her legs down from his shoulders and stands.

His mouth is wet with her and it makes her stomach coil with heat, rubbing her legs together at the sight. He undoes his tie, keeping his eyes on her as he pulls it off, continuing his work on his shirt. She makes to sit up and help but he shakes his head, assuring her he’s fine.

His belt goes and then his pants and Leslie is practically salivating at the unveiling of his taut and strong body. There’s the slightness of his waist, the angles of his hip bones, and dusting of hair along his chest and stomach. There’s the faint farmer’s tan and the thickness of his legs. When his underwear is gone and his dick springs free, she sits up again, despite his protests. 

“Please,” she says, crawling toward him. There’s a bead of precum leaking out of him and she’s licking her lips, starving. 

“Leslie—  _ ah, fuck.” _

He sighs as her tongue catches the tip of his dick and he smooths a hand through her hair, sweeping it aside and pulling it into his fist to keep it out of her face, which is as much for her as it is for him. 

Her tongue swirls along the head and takes a long drag along his length and she sighs, remembering how clean and beautiful he tastes. She wraps her lips around him and sucks, reslishing in the soft push of his hips as she goes, enjoying the tap to the back of her throat, how it feels different at this angle. Her hand comes up to his hip, sliding over his ass to push him closer, and he thrusts into her mouth with a string of expletives and groans that makes arousal slip down her thighs. 

“Leslie, fuck… this,  _ fuck _ .” He gently pulls her off of him and she sits back on her heels, confused. “No, no, that was… good. Too good. I don't want to cum in your mouth.”

Leslie preens, just a small tip of her chin in pride. She’s going to make him come undone so quickly. 

He boops her nose and smiles and it’s like they’re back in the bubble, sneaking around her house and laughing together, half naked and touching each other through TV shows. He’s teasing her about sleep and she’s begging him to stay up and talk about the book she’s reading or let her suck his dick. 

Her eyes sting with the threat of tears, and Ben is quick to grab her and kiss her.

They kiss slowly, and it makes her head cloud with fog, like cotton candy, pink and pale blue, soft and beautiful. 

Their lips stay together as he lays her down and nestles between her legs, their bodies moving with a lazy sway, trying to connect but not bothered enough to detach their lips or their hands from hair and necks.

Finally Ben breaks and he swipes a tear from her cheek before reaching between them and lining up their bodies. He sighs when his dick pushes against her entrance, and she spreads her legs, whispering his name.

“I love you,” she says, and he pushes into her with a familiar thrust. She remembers this. Remembers how full and complete she always felt with that first push. “I love you.”

Ben kisses her, deep and slow as he thrusts and they connect at every point they can, savoring each other’s bodies, their reconnection, their love.

He takes so long to stop kissing her, going back for more every time their lips pull apart. They smile into the last kiss and he finally sits up on his knees, pulling her closer to him and lifting her ass in a new angle as he thrusts into her, harder this time. She gasps, letting out a groan with her exhale.

“I love you,” he says, his voice shaky with the feel of her, but sure in its meaning.

Leslie’s heart beats, hard and full. He loves her. Her Ben. Her Ben who isn’t leaving, who would never leave.

“Ben,” Leslie says, “please.”

And as if no time has passed and he hasn’t forgotten just what she needs, he grabs her hips and pounds into her.

He fucks her, praising the feel of her, lamenting at how he missed her, groans peppering between curse words and slaps of skin against skin. Leslie lets her hands fall above her head and she rocks her hips as best she can against the thrusts. Each push is a reminder from before and a promise of after.

He’s building and confessing he’s going to cum much sooner than he probably wants, but he can’t stop. Leslie encourages him, places a hand on her breast and massages it just how she knows he likes and he curses, spilling inside her with shaky, loud groans. 

He finally collapses on top of her and Leslie refuses to let him go, relishing in the weight of his body, the feeling of him softening inside her. His back is slick with sweat and the muscles there are tight but slowly loosening under her fingers.

They lay spent and breathing together. He slips out of her and she whines, gripping at him as he laughs, turning them so they’re facing each other. He traces the lines of her face and kisses her fingers when she tries to do the same to him. They kiss lazily and she feels the pull of sleep tugging at her as if her body knows she’s finally free to rest.

“Stay the night,” Ben says. “Even if there’s a crazy party going on out there.”

Leslie nuzzles into his neck. “M’kay.”

“I don’t trust any of these people, though,” he says, rolling to grab a t-shirt from the pile at their heads. Leslie pulls it on and Ben throws her underwear at her, and she carries them to the adjacent bathroom. 

As she’s washing her hands, she hears a drawer close, and she squints her droopy eyes at him when she walks back into his room. 

He’s standing by his desk, underwear back on, a t-shirt from the pile pulled over his head. She takes in the lean muscles along his arms, the jutting of bones along his waist. Dreamy and completely hers.

“Ah,” he winces, waving something in his hand. “I was… I…”

“What’s this?” Leslie asks, snuggling against his side. 

It’s a photograph. Of them.

She wraps her arms around his waist and nuzzles deeper into him. She turns her head to find any bit of him she can kiss, catching his chest. He pins the photo up on his bulletin board, and Leslie smiles at him as he leans down to kiss her.

The picture is from the Harvest Festival. Before the bubble, before anything, but at the start of everything. She’s looking at Lil Sebastian and Ben is watching her, the whole picture emanating a glow of love that is so obvious it’s almost funny. 

What a joke to think they could ever live without each other. 


End file.
